We had a wonderful evening yesterday at our first Spanish "fiesta". The
children here get their presents today (6th) and they are brought not by
Santa but by the Three Kings. Consequently Epiphany is a big deal and most
towns have parades and celebrations, and the children get to meet the kings
afterwards and make their requests.
We have spent the last couple of days in Santiago de Compostella where the
parade is held on the night of the 5th. So yesterday afternoon we headed
into town and by 6pm found ourselves in the crowd lining the street below
the main square, and surrounded by very excited children, spray cans of
fake snow at the ready. First came the camels, followed by a motley
collection of marching bands, men on stilts, unicyclists, toy soldiers and
floats. Each of the three kings had his own float, (dissapointingly they
weren't riding the camels!) and threw sweets into the crowds as they
passed. The procession ended in the main square in front of the cathedral,
where we joined the crowds to see the mayor and the kings appear on a
balcony of one of the buildings. And then the fireworks started..........
they were great, lots of big rockets and it made up for missing them at New
Year; however they were being let off from within the square, probably only
10m from the edge of the crowds! This was one accasion where I was wishing
for the more rigorous UK restrictions, I now have a large burn on my hat
(luckily not my Italian one as that would have been very upsetting!) from
the falling embers and quite a lot of the crowd put up their umbrellas to
avoid a similar fate! Despite this it was a great evening with a wonderful
atmosphere (not a drunkard in site) and a lovely way to end the Christmas
season.
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